


#231

by yuliaplisetskaya



Series: hang the DJ AU [1]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: M/M, Soulmate AU, Work In Progress, hang the dj au, very brief implication of self-harming but the intent is not to harm oneself
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-03
Updated: 2018-02-03
Packaged: 2019-03-12 22:15:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13556679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuliaplisetskaya/pseuds/yuliaplisetskaya
Summary: Yuuri has never dreamed of a person. Victor has never dreamed, period.





	#231

The doorbell rings once.

Yuuri pads to the front of their flat, peeks at the peephole. The corridor is deserted. Flat, dusted red carpet covers the expanse of tiles. Across their flat, #231 has left two empty Chinese takeaway boxes to be picked up by the cleaning service next morning.

He looks through the keyhole, just in case. It’s still empty.

“There’s no one, _anata_. Sleep. I’ll be here,”

.

The doorbell rings once.

Victor’s wide awake. Beside him, Yuuri is thrashing in his sleep, the sheets twisted around his ankles. His clammy fingers dig into Victor’s arms, leaving angry red crescent marks. Victor whispers apologies to soothe him.

“Don’t answer the door,” Yuuri pleads, voice hoarse, tears streaming from closed eyelids.

“I won’t,” Victor promises, and punctuates the vow with a kiss to his husband’s forehead.

Silence blankets their room as the echo of the doorbell fades.

.

The doorbell rings once.

“Ah, you’re expecting someone? I can go now–”

“No, Phichit-kun, it’s okay,” Yuuri cuts him off with a strained smile. “It’s been a while since we talk. I wish we could meet, though,”

“You will be in Bangkok for Phichit On Ice next month, right?”

“Would never dream of missing it,” Yuuri’s not sure he’ll last two weeks, let alone a month. “So, how’s married life treating you?”

“Okay, it’s, like, so hectic, I don’t know how you manage it for years,” Phichit laughs. “First I have to deal with the cousins–do you know Seung-gil has forty three cousins?–and then moving to Busan, and apparently my pronunciation is atrocious despite the fact I’ve spoken Korean for three years! I couldn’t even buy anything at the convenience store on the first few days,”

“Mm, maybe it’s just Busan,” Yuuri offers.

“Maybe. But it’s good, though, being married. I mean, you can slip into your dream when you fall asleep and create a different universe with your partner there. It’s like a fairytale,” Phichit sighs dreamily. “I know how you feel now, Yuuri. I mean, it’s already amazing that you had your soulmate dreams about your idol, but now that you’re married you get to share a landscape with him every night! I’m so happy for you,”

Yuuri swallows. “No, Phichit _._ I _am_ happy for you,”

.

The doorbell rings twice.

Yuuri unplugs his left earbud. The muffled voice of an ASMR video flows through the small spealer holes.

“I’ve always had nightmares,”

Victor’s fingers freeze at the bottom of the current page he’s reading. Then, slowly, he sets his book down and turns around to face Yuuri.

“I don’t remember the last time I sleep without a dream, or the last time I have a nice dream. I always wake up in cold sweats, and my chest always hurts. Spent too much nights crying–I don’t know whether from relief of waking up or just pure terror.

"When I was a child I often found myself thinking, is this it? Is my soulmate a monster?” Yuuri laughs, and it’s a dry, frustrated sound. Victor holds him closer as he breaks down in tears. “It-it’s not even the monster part that scares me. I didn’t care what shape they took. What scares me is that they’re always out to get me, every night, everytime I close my eyes,”

“I’m here,” Victor reassures him, raising Yuuri’s right hand to his lips and kissing the golden band around his fourth finger. “I wish I could help you through the night. I’m sorry,”

“But you can’t. We’re not connected. You’ve never been able to dream about me,” Yuuri says, “But it’s not your fault, Vitenka,”

“Okay,” says Victor, although he finds that hard to believe. Through the crack in the window, he can see that the sun is starting to rise. “Then I’ll be here, like always, to pull you up whenever you feel you’ve gone too far down. Is that alright, solnyshko?”

“Alright,” Yuuri kisses him, long and warm, before lying back down again. “Alright,”

.

The doorbell rings twice.

Victor knows how it normally goes, as any person on this universe does. You get assigned a dream. Everyone has a unique dream with a single person recurring in each of it. When you meet the person and fall asleep in their proximity, you share the dream and together, you can change the plot or setting of what initially was a fixed, assigned scenario.

It never went like that for Victor.

He always opens his eyes to another darkness. If he wants to play, he has to build the city himself, invents the scenarios by himself. It’s what the people from the Old Era called ‘lucid dreaming’, as if any part of his subconscious when he’s asleep holds a semblance of clarity. He doesn’t know much. He can’t even remember how he knows the phrase. There’s not much about the past on the internet, anyway, something about focusing to build the future for next generations of society.

He tried conjuring Yuuri, during their first few months together. At the time, Yuuri only told him that he never had a dream about anyone tangible, and that’s why he’d never bothered dating. Victor thought that maybe he could try to fix that for the two of them.

All he got from his trouble was the sound of alarm blaring in his ears as he was violently jolted awake from his sleep at 2am, Yuuri staring nervously at the small box of speaker at the corner of their living room.

_First warning. Citizens are reminded that no attempt of bonding with any person outside of their assignment is allowed. Once again, citizens are reminded…_

“But that’s not even supposed to be possible,” Victor cried out. “I was supposed to have a dream. Yuuri was supposed to dream about a person,”

_Disobeying the Law will result in banishment._

.

The doorbell rings twice.

“What did you do? When you run out of ideas to dream about?”

“But Yuuri, you know I’m full of surprises,” Victor winks. Yuuri rolls his eyes and smiles fondly.

“So you keep making new scenarios over and over the way you keep surprising the audience with your programs, then,”

“Yeah. No,” Victor pulls the sheet up to his chin and snuggles closer to Yuuri. His husband dutifully wraps him in a hug and cards his finger through soft, platinum hair. “Sometimes I sat alone in the dark. Most of the time. When I was twenty-two, I would just stay and not do anything until I woke up. There was no difference; dreaming or not, I only saw black,”

“What about now?”

“Now I replay whatever we did the day before,” Yuuri laughs. “No, really. There’s nothing better than remembering what you did with the love of your life–”

“–shh, they might hear you–”

“–shut up, Yuuri, you _are_ the love of my life, they can eat my ass–”

“No, seriously, only I get to do that. I don’t like sharing,”

“Oh my God will you let me finish,” Victor wheezes, batting Yuuri’s hand away. “I love you. I don’t care what any higher-ups who assigns any dreams has to say on the matter. I met you, and I fell in love with you, and there’s nothing they can do to change that. Not even if it still gets lonely in my dreams sometimes because I can’t picture you,”

“I love you too,” Yuuri whispers back readily.

“Will you ever tell me what happens in your dream?” asks Victor. “I won’t make you say whatever you don’t want to say, but I want to help you through it, if you’ll let me,”

For a moment there’s only silence. Then Yuuri speaks, his voice so small Victor has to strain in order to hear the words. “It was this apartment,” he starts softly, “I’ve always dreamed of this apartment,”

“Oh, solnyshko, I’m so sorry, we can move out tomorrow, I know another place we can afford near the rink–”

“It’s alright,” Yuuri cuts him off. “I know this would happen anyway. I regret nothing with you,”

“Then what happens next?”

“Then the doorbell rings three times,”

.

The doorbell rings three times.

Yuuri pads to the front door, peeks at the peephole. Across their flat, #231 has left three empty takeaway boxes outside to be cleared out by the cleaning service the next morning.

Will there ever be a next morning, Yuuri wonders, and drops to his knees to peek through the keyholes. The red carpet ripples, pristine.

The door bursts open.

Yuuri is knocked backwards by the sheer force of the door, his chest smarting. There are footsteps from the kitchen. Victor runs toward the torn entrance and swings a knife blindly at it. He can’t see anyone, not even Yuuri, but that’s the least of his concern right now.

There’s a heavy thud to the floor, and then silence.

“How,” is all Yuuri manages to croak out.

“I don’t know,” Victor answers, not meeting his eyes. He doesn’t know where Yuuri’s eyes will be. The landscape is already blurring in his vision. “I don’t even want to know,”

“We need to wake up,” says Yuuri.

“Yeah. Okay. Wait for me, I’ll be quick,” Victor presses the tip of the knife to his arm and wakes up with a start.

Next to him, Yuuri sleeps with a frown, knuckles clutching the sheet so tight they turn white.

“Solnyshko, wake up,” Victor shakes him. He doesn’t budge. “Wake up. Please. We’re running out of time,” Louder. Yuuri stays still. He runs to the pantry to grab a glass of the coldest water he can find and nearly trips himself on his way back to the bedroom.

“I’m so, so, so sorry, Yuuri,” he says as he dumps the entire content of the glass on Yuuri’s face. Yuuri wakes up, spluttering and coughing.

“Please forgive me–”

“We have to go,” says Yuuri, panicked.

“But where?”

“I don’t know, out? Somewhere that isn’t here? Is this the only place? What is the name of this goddamn town anyway?”

“I…I can’t remember,” Victor finishes lamely. “But that’s not important. I have shitty memory anyway,”

“I can’t remember too,” Yuuri pulls his hoodie on and drags Victor out of the room. “Isn’t there a gate somewhere? Maybe like a border? We can go to another state. Hopefully one that doesn’t have crazy rules like this,”

“Okay,” Victor only just remembers to breathe as he moves. “Okay,”

_Disobeying the Law will result in banishment._

“Fuck you,” they shout in unison as they go out to the corridor. Across their flat, #231 is an unoccupied room, door handle dusty with disuse. They run to the end of the hall. Victor wrenches the door to the emergency staircases open and together they bolt down the stairs,

at least, until the tiles glitch and dissolve beneath them.

It’s dark. And then, it’s too bright. Yuuri can barely make out the number above their head, which says “231”. There are other Victors and Yuuris around them, all clad in different outfits, all in similar states of distress with various numbers above their heads. Then, before he too glitches out of existence with Victor’s hand clasped in his, a bigger writing appears upward.

 

_1000 simulations completed_

_998 rebellions recorded - Match Rate: 99.8%_

_Simulation 231: Rebellion |_ _~~Compliance~~ _

**Author's Note:**

> find me on tumblr: @yuliaplisetskaya


End file.
